


Aftermath

by GlowAmber



Category: Tangled (2010), Tangled: The Series (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Cass and Eugene as tenuous siblings, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, angst with fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-07
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-05-03 09:29:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14566071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlowAmber/pseuds/GlowAmber
Summary: Cassandra struggles a little with the lack of personal space and the remnants of metal monsters. Eugene helps.[Final Chapter: Catharsis]





	1. Repression

She has nightmares that wake her in a cold sweat and leave her chest tight-- _too tight too tight too much she can't breathe..._

Blankets always seem coiled around her and it reminds her, terrifies her, of metal that squeezed and squeezed until she thought her ribs would crack.

She struggles from them and sits in ragged aching silence with her hands balled into fists. Her nails dig into her palms and, oh good, she's bleeding. It's easier to come back from the panic with the twinge of pain, she's still alive and safe. There is nothing holding her, she's okay.

_Okay is relative she knows, she's not okay and she's never been okay. She's very good at pretending, holding up an act until she can fall apart but_

“Cassandra?”

It's the right pronunciation, wrong voice; this is her issue. She has no space to fall apart and piece herself back together in quiet and solitude. Eugene is sat up on his bedroll and staring at her from across the embers of the fire. She doesn't meet his eyes, she looks everywhere but his face because the pity isn't something she wants or needs.

His mouth runs a mile a minute but for once he isn't talking, he's just waiting and she's not sure for what. Her tongue is thick in her mouth and her eyes dying. She doesn't feel like this is real, he should be blabbing on. She wishes for once he would talk so this would feel normal. So she could pretend a dream hadn't given her a panic attack.

And then she doesn't because she sees his hand move and for a blinding terrifying moment she is afraid. “Don't.” Cassandra says it forcefully, or tries, she half chokes on the word. It sounds pitiful and limp to her. It must to him, too, because he pauses before he continues to balance himself and rise to his feet.

_He doesn't wake Rapunzel and she's never been so grateful in her life, she wanted noise and didn't. Too much and too overwhelming, she'd be smothered by the Princess’ concern and love and she knows that she must have it worse so she can't burden her. (And hugs, she doesn't think she can stand being embraced.)_

Instead, he moves past the still sleeping Princess with her chameleon and sits next to her. And not next to her. He's close enough that she can feel the heat of his presence as surely as she feels the heat of the dying campfire.

When Eugene starts to talk, it is low and easy and it takes Cassandra all of three seconds to realize he is reciting one of his Flynn Rider books. From memory. He doesn't pause when he stirs the coals and time is passing. She can feel her limbs, again, and her breathing is even. Relaxed. 

When he pauses mid telling of Flynnigan’s dramatic battle against the crazed Earl to retrieve his water skin, she finds her voice, finally. 

“What happens next?”

He takes a few swallows, looking at her over the top of the container, then shrugs. “Guess you’ll find out tomorrow night.” There is a degree of concern behind his jovial tone and he points to the ground beneath her. He doesn't have to say anymore, but she does.

As she nestles back down, not under the blanket but on top of it, and says just loudly enough that she thinks he can hear.

_”Thanks.”_


	2. Purgation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cassandra falls apart, Eugene lets her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Decided to add on to this because it didn't feel resolved. We're closer to that, now.

She closes her eyes and then opens them and it is day, the world is bright and too sharp around the edges. Cassandra lays there, hands folded over her chest because she sleeps like she’s dead, _she wonders if that’s a sign._ There are voices burbling back and forth, one higher and happier and too loud too much, the other low and happy but quiet quiet quiet and not quiet enough.

Her head is pounding and she feels like she hasn’t slept at all. She feels like she blinked and time has moved, leaving her behind and empty. Still, she sits up slow and her tongue is thick in her mouth but she hides that and focuses on the embers of the fire and the people beyond it that sit close together and talk talk away.

“Good morning, Cassandra!” Rapunzel’s voice is too sharp too much and she feels the flinch but she’s too tired to be angry too tired to do more than nod. The Princess’ face is pinched when she looks at her next, a mix of worry and upset and, “Are you okay?”

She nods but that’s a lie, _because she’s not okay and never been okay, she’s just good at holding it together until she can fall apart._

Two nights in a row is too much, she doesn’t find out about the Earl’s defeat because she’s too leary of letting herself crumble again. Its bad enough Eugene witnessed it once she can’t let him see her do it all over again so soon, he can’t know her like this because she has to protect the Princess. She’s less Rapunzel’s lady-in-waiting now and more her personal guard, tinted with the colors of best friend but is she? 

She’s not sure about anything, right now, except for the ache in her bones and the dull ringing between her ears. She takes first watch and sits staring across the fire until she can’t feel her limbs, feels like she’s apart from her skin and there is a buzz that vibrates along the edges of her existence reminding her over and over again of the things she doesn’t want to think about but can’t let go and will never ever forget.

Several times the black rocks they’re following pair with the black of the sky and she sees tints of red and can smell the tang of metal. There’s nothing around her, she sits on the blankets, but she can almost feel her arms compress into her sides and she feels tight too tight like she can’t _breath._

She forgets to wake Eugene for his watch and doesn’t realize it until they’re both shuffling awake and the sky is actually tinting red as the sun rises. She’s okay, she says, and Rapunzel looks less convinced than the day before and Cassandra wonders, not for the first time, if she’s ever going to be okay. When was the last time she felt like the world was alright?

There are fleeting older memories of something warm and solid, something real for her feet to stand on and she tries to chase those and hold onto them as they pack up to keep chasing the rocks. She feels like she’ll never find the end of either, the rocks go on and on into eternity and the memories are just her mind conjuring up things to give her a reason to _push on._

They ride for too long and not long enough, Fidella thunders beneath her and she feels the strong beat of her heart just as surely as the sound of her hooves and maybe she pushes her too much but the wind on her cheeks gives her a rush. Free, she feels free and wild and loose for a moment, and then they come to a stop and it all comes to a stop too fast too soon.

She feels it in her throat, in her chest, clawing wildly for escape. They don’t talk about watch as they set up camp and as they eat dinner and she wonders if she’s spoken at all, today, past this morning? She can’t remember, there’s gaps in her memories that stretch back back back to when she was younger and she told Eugene “I don’t remember them” and was that a lie? She thinks it is true, she can’t possibly remember them when she can barely remember what Varian said only days ago as he clamped metal around her middle and _she feels the tightness again her body ready to pop and her lungs seconds from giving out her bones ready to break under the pressure this is where she dies--_

“I’ll take first watch.” Her tongue feels dry and her lips chapped but she stares at her hands and tries to forget what dying feels like. She’s not okay, she’s never been okay, and she’s failing to pretend anymore, she knows, because she can feel the weight of Rapunzel’s eyes on her.

“Are you sure? You really should get some sleep,” she means well when she says that, Cassandra knows, and she tries not to flinch and fails at the thought of what sleep will bring to her.

“I’m okay.” _Liar, liar,_ her mind whispers and she doesn’t look up to meet the Princess’ gaze, doesn’t need to look up to know Eugene has pulled her aside to say something. She just sits and stares at the fire and when she eats, she doesn’t taste it. 

Time moves in blinks and pauses, it either goes so fast she cannot track it or stretches on so long she cannot find the end of it. It feels like hours before she sees the other two start laying down on their bed rolls, longer until Rapunzel is asleep, and then it’s a blink because when did Eugene get beside her?

She startles, sluggish, and stares at him with wide wild eyes for much too long because he’s staring back at her like she’s breaking apart and maybe she is? No, she is, but she isn’t supposed to do that around others, she’s supposed to be okay and then fall apart when she’s alone and… and…

He doesn’t touch her and she’s grateful, she sees his hand twitch like he wants to, because hugs are what they do in this friend group and like it or not she supposes she and Eugene _are_ friends. It is disconcerting how easy it is to admit that but as annoyingly laid back as Eugene is, and how does he do that when everything is so crazy?, he always steps up to the plate and she sort of hates that he’s a better person than her. 

_He’s better at being a person, than her,_ her mind whispers like the traitor it is because if its not summoning up near death experiences and panic attacks its tearing her down constantly and this is what its like to be her.

“Do you want to talk about it?” He sounds hesitant and she doesn’t blame him but she’s glad, so glad, he keeps his hands to himself. No hugs, no touches, no tightness threatening to swallow her whole and pop her into nothing but gore and reveal the emptiness she knows that is swelling within her. 

_And that’s the problem, it takes so little to make her feel trapped because she’s bubbling from within, stretched too thin over nothingness and she’s not okay so not okay._

Like an echo, like last night never happened and they’re back to page one, she stares at the fire and asks, “What happens next?”

It takes a moment for it click and she feels her shoulders slump a little as he starts talking and his voice is low low low, soft, easy on her ears. The words are intense but his voice is smooth and soothing. It isn’t so much the story she needs but it’s something to lose herself in, distract herself with. There wasn’t much left to that story, it seems, because he finishes before she is tired. There is still a strange dizziness lingering in her head and she sits quiet, eyes wide, and digs her fingers into her palms.

That hurts and it helps her drag in deep breaths, reminds her she needs to breathe and that this is real.

“I almost died.”

Voicing it feels so wrong, her throat is raw and thick and she almost chokes on those words, feels her eyes sting and it all feels _wrong wrong wrong._ But she said it, it hangs there, and her shoulders feel a little lighter for it. How can something wrong make her feel better? 

Eugene is quiet, and she thinks he was gearing up to tell her the next story because his jaw hangs open and then clicks shut when she risks a glance his way. He waits and she rewards that with a long sigh, slumping forward to tangle her fingers in her hair and shield her face behind her arms with her knees drawn to her chest. 

But she said it, she knows it, she feels the rest of it welling up in her throat as she struggles not to hold it in but to find the words to let it just come out. The emptiness is strange because it’s not like she’s collapsing in on herself but exploding out and the pressure is finally forcing her to speak up.

“He almost killed me,” and it seems laughable because Varian is a child and they were almost friends and she almost trusted him but he didn’t seem like a little boy when he knocked her to the ground, didn’t seem like a child when he lifted her off her feet in a metal vice with the intent to hurt and destroy and make everyone feel as empty as he did-- and it almost worked. 

_She feels it._

“He almost killed me and I can’t, I can’t shake it? I can’t find my way past it, I just… keep getting … keep feeling my feet leave the ground.” She feels like actually throwing up as she talks about it, bile burns at her and twists her stomach into knots, “I close my eyes and it all plays out over and over again, I can’t-- I can’t sleep.” 

There’s more to it, than that, more than just almost dying because she’s not ever that simple or predictable, but its all she has in her to admit. She thrives on schedules and patterns and order and ever since Rapunzel’s birthday, she has been thrown into so much chaos that she cannot find her feet and balance herself out. 

It’s part terror over betrayal and her near death experience and part sheer panic over losing control. She’s okay in small doses, in rules and regulations and structure. Even her sneaking out was planned ahead because she’s that kind of person. In the absence of understanding and safety, this is where she can make due.

And that’s what it is.

She must have said that aloud because Eugene asks, “That’s what what is?”

“I can’t remember the last time I felt safe.” 

It’s a stunning revelation, one she can’t believe she voiced, one that she has been struggling to name and place. What is safety? She can’t recall the time but she can recall the feeling, its that warm solid feeling she’s been chasing. She pushes to be a guard, she pushes for her father’s approval, she pushes to protect and defend herself, she pushes and pushes and pushes and the ground keeps slipping out from under her like she’s trying to walk on water and just drowning instead.

And once its said, she can’t take it back. Her eyes are stinging and her face is hot and it trickles out drop by drop until its a stream and she’s got her head between her knees. Her chest heaves and struggles with her breathing because she’s sobbing and hyperventilating all at once, because this is what it feels like to really fall apart, this is what she’s been struggling to really hold in. She’s not okay, but maybe she was okay once, and she’s tired of pretending she’s okay, tired of pushing and pushing because everything hurts and this emptiness is bubbling out of her.

_If Varian had kept squeezing, would she have died before this void had been forced out?_

There is warmth around her shoulders and then around her and her face presses into Eugene’s shoulder as she hiccups and chokes on her tears. She knows he’s saying something but the words don’t matter because she can’t hear anything over the thundering beat of her heart and the blood in her ears, but his hand is on her back and this is warm and solid and, fuck, its safe. If she wasn’t so ragged around the edges, she’d snipe about this, but she needs it and needs to be crushed. 

_It’s tight too tight too much and she can’t breathe_ and she realizes now why the thought of Rapunzel hugging her panicked her so much the night previous, she was scared to let them see her break and it’s too late to take it back now. She wasn’t ready then, she’s still not ready now really, but she needs it. She’s not an island, she can’t do it all herself, she has friends? Rapunzel is her best friend and … and so is Eugene, she has friends, she knows that Rapunzel leans on her and why is she so leery of leaning back? Friendship is a two way street but she’s never had friends before and it’s difficult to learn how to be a person.

She cries until she has nothing left in her, wets Eugene’s shirt until it’s soaked and he doesn’t comment, he just runs a hand over her hair over and over again and she can finally hear him speaking and its just soothing and nonsense. It doesn’t even sound like words sometimes but just noises that are oddly comforting and this idiot is trying his best but she wonders what a picture she must make, the sarcastic woman he was terrified of crying herself into hysterics on his shoulder. 

It … makes her laugh, a choked giggle that’s remarkably ungraceful and then she stops fighting the tension and just relaxes against him. She lets someone else support her, for once, breaks down and opens up and it was Eugene, of all people, Eugene who squabbles with her on the daily but defends her when she needs it, Eugene who threw her sword and then jumped to her rescue later. Eugene who tried to talk her out of a panic attack and was ready to do so again.

Eugene who is better at being a person than she is, even with all his lazy flaws. He’s … like family, and that’s something startling to realize. Rapunzel is her best friend but Eugene has become … a brother? She loves him and hates him and he’s dependable and he _cares._

“Well, I think this shirt needed a good wash anyways.” He says and she snorts, chokes on her laughter again, unable to help it, and she can hear the relief in his voice as much as she feels it in his shoulder when he follows up with, “So you’re in charge of my laundry now, yeah?”

“Not on your life.” 

Her words are a little slurred from crying and exhaustion and god her muscles feel so heavy, her eyes are closed and she feels like the world is slipping away but she’s not just blinking into darkness this time. It settles over her slow and easy, like she’s sinking into a warm bath. She shouldn’t fall asleep here, not like this, she has first watch, but Eugene says something and she can’t quite make out the words.

“Mmm?” She tries, shifts to try and look up and understand, but he just presses her head back to his shoulder light and she doesn’t fight it. She’s so tired and she needs this, she wants this, and she feels a smile on her lips as she drifts to sleep finally.

_She’s not okay, but she will be, she’s going to be just fine._


	3. Catharsis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cassandra finds her way home and faces her fear.

The mind has a way of playing of tricks on you, a habit of amplifying your fears and worries until something small has worked its way into a giant that looms over you. Stuck in the shadow of a nightmare, Cassandra stares ahead and tries to make sense of what has led her here. Back in Corona, back to the Castle, back to the hallways where a teenager stands with his hands at his sides and guards surrounding him.

She remembers Varian, fleetingly, from when they first met. Short with buck teeth and freckles, blue eyes that lit with joy like Rapunzel’s. He was vibrant but now he is faded, superimposed with a black automaton and a red window with his face leering out at her. His features looked so much sharper that just remembering him cuts at her, and she struggled to justify that they were one and the same.

The Varian before her is neither of those two. There is a haggardness to him, a thinness. He is sluggish and lean, worn down by grief and sorrow. The skin beneath his eyes look bruised from lack of sleep, his hair lank and greasy. He has grown while she’s been gone, while they’ve been gone, and changed all together.

Anyone else would feel pity for him. He is a sad sight, after all, but she has spent enough time playing to the tune of his pied piper’s flute.

Instead she stares at him and he stares back while she pieces together the features she knows and tries to place where the two Varians she remembers belong. The squint of his eyes and the furrow of his brow-- there, that’s the Varian who tried to murder her. The freckles on his cheeks and the way he fidgets with his gloves, there is the Varian who tried to impress her. 

There is little of either left, just enough that a tilt of his head brings back flashes of times long past. She came to him, she saved him, she broke a promise, he forgave her, she chose him, she saved him, he betrayed them, he lied to them, he tried to ki--

And she slows her thoughts, digs her fingers into her crossed arms, tries to regulate her breathing before she goes too far down the rabbit hole of bad thoughts. Eugene and Rapunzel and Lance have all helped her, she has found a path through dark waters she can walk-- but sometimes she slips and it is their words that pull her back to the solid ground. It is the reading of Flynnigan Rider, it is Rapunzel’s admiration and respect, it is Lance’s adoration and loyalty. They provide a beacon that guides her back to where her feet can find purchase and she does not have to worry about drowning anymore.

Varian is still staring, and she is staring back. There is no prison for him that he has not built for himself. He has harmed himself worse than they ever could, marred by grief and desperation. It’s been over a year, and he is grown taller, but she feels like he is still so small. He isn’t the giant of her nightmares and her death fears. 

He’s a little boy. One she once called friend.

“I’m sorry,” He whispers, and its sincere. She thinks its sincere, it rings true, the way his eyes clutch at hers and the sorrowful slant to his mouth. She also realizes it doesn’t matter if he’s sorry or not. Cassandra watches him as the realization dawns on her, she doesn’t have to forgive him, she doesn’t need to forget this. She is moving on, and she doesn’t need the apology. He needs to give it, he needs the closure-- she has found hers already just looking at him.

“I know.” She replies, and says no more. 

This isn’t the boy she befriended and bonded with over fatherly pride. This isn’t the friend who terrorized her, who tried to murder her in a fit of childish rage. This is someone else, and she doesn’t need to know who he is besides that he is sorry and a stranger.

When she turns away, his shoulders fall with weight and hers feel lighter. A tiny part of her says she should make him feel better, but a larger part tells her that’s not her problem or her duty. Varian was manipulative from day one, an expert in guilt and pity garnering. She can’t help him get better, not when it comes at a cost to herself. There are other people who can help him, people he has not hurt. It’s not her job to wound herself again and again for him, neither of them will get better for it.

So she lifts her chin, and she strides away from him. The gardens are lovely, this time of day, she knows. She can hear her friends on the veranda, waiting for her, the boisterous chatter and laughter brings warmth back into her, breathes color back into her. She is stepping out of the black and white of Varian’s threatening shade and into the technicolor painting that is their group.

There is a hitch to Rapunzel’s voice, an angle to her brow, when she stands and waves an arm wildly at her approach, “Cass!” She feels the smile bloom on her face, because these are her friends and even Eugene looks mildly worried, concern lurking behind his casual demeanor. Lance leans forward, expectantly, ready to leap to her defense.

These are her friends and she feels full to bursting, wildly stretched thin over the bubbling feeling of joy. She lifts a hand and waves back, and when she is close enough, she catches the Princess when she tosses herself into Cassandra’s arms. The hug is tight and she can’t breath, but it’s a good feeling. She is surrounded and encased by love and joy. She can trust these people, she can fall and know they will catch her.

“How’d it go?” Eugene grins at her, the tension gone from the group as quickly as it hit, and she sits across from him. She snatches a slice of banana cream pie from the center plate, and the swirls of artistry tell her that Lance made this. A comfort in case things went bad, a celebration if they went well. The smile that stretches her face is wide and she tilts her head down to mask the sheer love she feels sitting with them. They know it, anyways, she knows.

_“I’m okay, everything’s just fine.”_


End file.
